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Grantees of offices, commissions and pardons
(1413-1416)The Patent Rolls are the Chancery enrolments of royal letters patent. Those for the 1st, 2nd and 3rd years of the reign of king Henry V (21 March 1413 to 20 March 1416) were edited for the Public Record Office by R. C. Fowler, and published in 1910. The main contents are royal commissions and grants; ratifications of ecclesiastical estates; writs of aid to royal servants and purveyors; and pardons. The commissions of the peace issued for the English towns and counties and entered on the rolls, being largely repetitive, have been consolidated in a single appendix.

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Close Rolls
(1441-1447)The close rolls of the 20th to 25th years of the reign of king Henry VI record the main artery of government administration in England, the orders sent out day by day to individual officers, especially sheriffs of shires: they are an exceptionally rich source for so early a period. There is also some material relating to Wales, Scotland, Ireland and the English possessions in France.

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Close Rolls
(1447-1454)The close rolls of the 26th to 32nd years of the reign of king Henry VI record the main artery of government administration in England, the orders sent out day by day to individual officers, especially sheriffs of shires: they are an exceptionally rich source for so early a period. There is also some material relating to Wales, Scotland, Ireland and the English possessions in France.

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Taxpayers in Sussex
(1524-1525)By Act of Parliament of 1523 (14 & 15 Hen. III, c. 16) a general subsidy was raised, spread over four years, from laymen, clergy and peers. In each of the first two years 1s in the £ was raised from annual income from land; 1s in the £ on capital goods worth over £2 and under £20; and a flat payment of 4d on goods worth from £1 to £2, and also by persons aged 16 and upwards in receipt of £1 per annum in wages. In the third year a further shilling in the pound was payable on land worth £50 and upwards a year; and in the fourth year a shilling in the pound on goods worth £50 and upwards. To raise this revenue, returns were required from every hundred, parish or township. In Sussex, the returns for 1524 and 1525 cover the city of Chichester (divided into Estrata, Westrata, Southstrata, North[strata] and Palenta), the borough of Midhurst, and then the rest of the county divided into rapes, within those into hundreds, and within those into boroughs, tithings, liberties, townships or parishes. It is important to note that the cinque ports of Hastings, Rye and Winchelsea were exempt from the subsidy, except for alien inhabitants; and that the town of Westbourne was also exempted 'as the town was lately destroyed by fire'. Aliens are noted as such, sometimes with nationality; and Brighthelmstone (Brighton), which had been burnt by the French in 1514, is only represented fragmentarily. The Sussex Record Society published this transcript and edition by Julian Cornwall of the 1524 and 1525 returns: the 1524 return was used for the main transcript where possible, names peculiar to the 1524 lists being marked with an asterisk, and those with amendments in 1524 with a dagger. At the foot of each 1524 return the new names from 1525 are given. Only the amount of the assessment is printed (m. = marks). Letters prefixed to the sum give the basis of the assessment, no letter (or G) meaning that it was on goods - A, annual wages; D, annual wages of day-labourers; F, fees or salaries of office; L, lands; P, profits; W, wages; x, no basis stated.

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Militia in Norton Ferris hundred, Somerset
(1569)A muster of the ablemen, gunners, light horsemen, pikemen, archers and billmen available from this hundred, compiled by sir Hugh Paulet, sir Maurice Barkeley, sir Ralph Hopton and John Horner in answer to a royal commission of the 11th year of queen Elizabeth. The returns are arranged by tithing. The hundred consisted of the parishes of Bratton Seymour, Charlton Musgrave, Cucklington, Kilmington, Penselwood, Shepton Montague, Stoke Trister and (the market town of) Wincanton, as well as parts of the Wiltshire parishes of Maiden Bradley and Stourton. (The sample shown is from the return for the borough of Axbridge)

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Liegemen and Traitors, Pirates and Spies
(1578-1580)The Privy Council of queen Elizabeth was responsible for internal security in England and Wales, and dealt with all manner of special and urgent matters

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Hastings family deeds
(1100-1600)John Harley of the Historical Manuscripts Commission was invited by Reginald Rawdon Hastings to examine his family's extensive archives at the Manor House, Ashby de la Zouche, in Leicestershire. Harley produced a detailed calendar, of which is the first volume, published in 1928, Hastings himself having since died, and Harley having been killed at Gallipoli. This volume covers four categories of the records: the Ancient Deeds; Manorial and other Documents; Accounts and Inventories; and Miscellaneous Papers. Most, but not all, of the material is mediaeval. About half of the deeds relate to the family property in Leicestershire; then there are sections for Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Northamptonshire, Lincolnshire, Warwickshire, Staffordshire, Yorkshire, Northumberland, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, London, Wiltshire, Somersetshire, Devonshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, &c. The manorial section includes a partitions of the estates of the Earls of Leicester and Wilton about 1204 and 1277; manor court rolls are mentioned, but not extracted. Choicer items from the family accounts and inventories are copied in extenso for 1596 and 1607, and thereafter summarised. Most of the later material is merely dipped into for curiosities.

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Official Papers
(1651)The State Papers Domestic cover all manner of business relating to Britain, Ireland and the colonies, conducted by the Council of State, as well as other miscellaneous records. These records are from January to October 1651.

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Inhabitants of Manchester, and travellers
(1633-1666)The constables' accounts of the manor of Manchester in Lancashire from 1633 to 1647 were edited by J. P. Earwaker and published in 1892. The accounts largely consist of details of disbursements by the constables, and as such include payments to paupers and soldiers with passes to help them on their journeys to and from other parts of the country. Earwaker added nine 'important appendices' to the work: 1. Disbursements and Receipts during the Plague of Manchester, 1605-6 and 1606 (from State Papers Domestic in the Public Record Office); 2. List of the Books of Assessment, Charity Money Accounts, &c., now in the Possession of the Corporation; 3. List of the Inhabitants of Manchester in 1648 (pages 181 to 201); 4. List of the Inhabitants of Manchester in 1651 (202-221); 5. Disbursements of the Constables in 1651-2; 6. List of the Inhabitants of Manchester assessed in 1659 (225-246); 7. A Second List of the Inhabitants of Manchester in 1659 (247-260); 8. List of the Inhabitants of Manchester assessed in 1666 (261-283); and 9. List of Uncommon, Obsolete, and Dialect Words to be found in the Preceding Pages.

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Suffolk householders
(1674)Hearth tax was raised by assessing each householder on the number of chimneys to the dwelling. This provided a simple way to make a rough judgment as to the value of the dwelling: paupers were issued exemption certificates, but they too were listed at the end of each return. The returns were made by township, grouped by hundred. A complete copy of the hearth tax return for each shire was sent to the Exchequer: this is the return for Suffolk for Lady Day (25 March) 1674 (E 179/257/14) as printed in 1905 as Suffolk Green Book no xi, vol. 13. The numbers given are the numbers of hearths: where two or more people are grouped together with one number, it may be assumed that they were heads of separate households sharing a single building with that number of chimneys.